Life is a Circus and you are the Juggler!

“Imagine life is a game in which you are juggling five balls. The balls are called work, family, health, friends and integrity. And you’re keeping all of them in the air.

But one day, you finally come to understand that work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. The other four balls – family, health, friends, and integrity – are made of glass. If you drop one of these, it will be irrevocably scuffed, nicked, perhaps even shattered.

And once you truly understand the lesson of the five balls, you will have the beginnings of balance in your life.”

A friend of mine, mentioned this saying to me once, and it got me thinking: So what constitutes the 5 balls that I am juggling?

Work: OR let’s say career –

Besides the (minimum) 9 hours (yes, flexible work hours generally don’t work in the employee’s favor) of work everyday, there is a more taxing job at hand: Trying to find answers to all those questions in life

What do I want to do in life?

Am I looking at work in the wrong way?

Am I in the right profession?

Am I in the right sector?

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Where should I do an MBA?

Or rather, Should I do an MBA at all?

What will I do afterwards?

Should I startup?

What if I fail?

Family –

Currently I don’t think this is very difficult to handle, but I hope I could spend more time with the whole family other than just playing carom or watching an odd movie together.

Health –

My only aim in this respect is to be fit enough to be able to eat anything and everything I want without having to worry about my health or the number of calories I consume or the amount of fat that’s clogging my arteries. What complicates it is the fact that fitness is not an event, but a continuous state of being.

Friends –

Before IIT, my problem was that I had very few friends, even more, I was an introvert and didn’t hang out with them much either – and liked it!

Now, I have so many friends, and I want to be with ALL of them – and not just meet, spend quality time – have those long (and often stupid) discussions we had back at IIT. But that is so difficult because they are all so far and busy! There is this constant fear that I will lose touch with at least a few…

Integrity –

This is one of the most easiest and at the same time, toughest balls to manage:

Easiest, because it does not require any time, money or physical effort to manage.

Difficult, because it is tested at each and every single moment of life – you never know when it will hit you!

In addition there are things called interests or hobbies or passions (which ideally should coincide with work):

Learning to play the guitar

Reading

Cooking (no, really)

Trekking

Blogging/Tweeting (which is consider a legitimate time consuming hobby)

And there are always the constraints of Time, Money and Energy…it’s like juggling while trying to balance yourself on a tightrope – and without no training at all!Maybe that’s why, I’ve been making the mistake of worrying more about the rubber ball than anything else –

Is this Life?

And now that I realise there’s so much of juggling to do, I guess I’ll have to get back – to life!